G'day guys,

I need help with a problem I am having.
I am trying to get an old pc working again but it just won't happen.

When I turn it on I get the IBM APTIVA splash screen come up but then I get a blank screen with just a key symbol on it. I have no idea what the password would be as I have never seen this before.
The password is 7 characters long and I only get 3 tries before I get this message; "Incorrect password specified. System halted".

I have to turn it off as nothing works.

Any ideas?

Shaun.

Hi shuanc,

Welcome to PCHF.

If it's coming up with a password screen, then somebody would have needed to create a password in order for it to ask for it.

Luckey enough, you should be able to reset this password by opening up the PC, and removing the battery for a short while. Depending on your PC model, this battery should be on the corner of the motherboard, shown as BTY on this diagram:

You could also reset a small jumper on the mother board. But umm yea I like the battery idea much more lol. MUCH SAFER!!!

thanks so much for your help, i really appreciate it

I had to reinstall everything but now its finally up and running.

Thanks again.

Shaun.

Great to hear - see you again Shaun.

Marked as [Fixed]